5.29.2009

"Supreme Court justices, like all of us, are emotional intuitionists. They begin their decision-making processes with certain models in their heads. These are models of how the world works and should work, which have been idiosyncratically ingrained by genes, culture, education, parents and events. These models shape the way judges perceive the world. "

2 comments:

Determinism is the god to which those who have no others eventually resort, since it provides the only remaining answers for questions about, "Why is this the way it is?"

And yet, they're fundamentally unsatisfying answers, because the human creature instinctually believes (not, I would argue, as a matter of determinism, but because of a deeply rooted contact with the real) that qualities such as "good" and "just" do in fact exist.

Nah, "good" and "just" are just gussied-up emotions we have every once and a while :)

But seriously, you make a very astute point.

Human beings are unavoidably creatures of purpose and meaning. How privileged we are as Christians to be privy to the true and ultimate purpose of mankind. It's much more thrilling than to "find meaning" in telling other people that their lives are meaningless.

Pretentious Precepts

"First Things means, first, that the first thing to be said about public life is that public life is not the first thing. First Things means, second, that there are first things, in the sense of first principles, for the right ordering of public life."

“A free society cannot survive if we are so free that nothing is expected of us.”